Sorry Stanford Soccer

Our hearts go out to the Stanford Women’s Soccer Team. They made it all the way to the finals, the championship game, and lost a heartbreaker to Notre Dame 1-0. (C and R know that feeling, losing in the championship game, like the Stanford Women’ Basketball Team did last year to UConn). Even more heartbreaking, Stanford was going for its first ever soccer title. And even MORE heartbreaking, they were in the title game last year and lost that one, too, to their arch rival, well, everyone’s archrival, North Carolina. Sort of like UConn is everyone’s archrival. North Carolina was the soccer team’s UConn, and even more, more heartbreaking was the fact North Carolina was eliminated earlier in the tournament and with them out of the way, Stanford thought this was going to be THE year.

The game was on TV and R was able to watch it, what with C busy trying to learn Brazilian dance steps, the Salsa, and country line dances all in one day. R said Notre Dame’s Melissa Henderson played like the best player in the country. In fact, she said Notre Dame just seemed hungrier. Plus, several of our forwards, including our best, Christen Press are small, and their defense was able to win more of the headers. Maybe we need to recruit taller soccer players. (Hmm, wonder how Kayla Pedersen would do as a college soccer player. Does she have four years of soccer eligibility left?).

R, admittedly not a fountain of soccer knowledge, said a huge bright spot for Stanford was freshmen goal keeper Emily Oliver. Let’s quote her, “The score easily would have been 3 or 4 nil without her heroic saves”. Did you like the use of the word “nil”? It’s a soccer term meaning zero, which is what Stanford is in soccer titles, which is causing our eyes to tear up. To come so close, twice in two years, it has got to be harder to lose the second time around.

A small consolation is several Stanford players getting picked for the All-Tournament Team: Camille Levin, Christen Press and the fearless Emily Oliver.

Well, third times a charm and we wish them best of luck for next season.